Baseball Outhits Wake Forest but Falls, 12-6, in NCAA Regional

Bassett Goes 4-for-5; Brown Homers in Defeat

WINSTON-SALEM, NC - Despite a four-hit performance by senior Mike Bassett and a 420-foot home run by Tony Brown, the Colonials fell to the seventh-seeded Wake Forest Demon Deacons, 12-6, in the NCAA sub-regional second game Friday night. A partisan Wake Forest crowd of 3,683 at Ernie Shore Field fell silent as GW jumped on Deacon ace Kyle Sleeth for a 3-0 lead after two innings. GW (42-22) will play Navy at 11:00 a.m. Saturday. The Midshipmen lost to Richmond, 15-5, earlier Friday.

After a scoreless first inning, the Colonials plated three runs on five solid hits in the top of the second inning. Bassett (Paramus, NJ/Paramus) and sophomore Jeff Fertitta (Baltimore, MD/Loyola Blakefield) each had infield singles. Fertitta then advanced to second and Bassett scored on freshman Anthony Raglani's (Indiana, PA/Indiana) RBI single to right field. Junior tri-captain Chris Barry (Orchard Park, NY/Canisius) broke out of a four-for-48 slump by driving a double to the left field wall plating Fertitta. Raglani scored the third run on a single to right field by Brown (Hockessin, DE/A.I. DuPont).

Wake Forest (45-11-1) responded in the bottom of the third with one run. Ryder Mathias singled down the left line to score Ben Ingold, who had tripled to right center field. With runners on second and third, GW starter Greg Conden (Owego, NY/Owego Free Academy) induced Wake batters to pop out twice, first to second base then to left field. He ended the inning by striking out rightfielder Ryan Johnson.

The Colonials added another run with two outs in the top of the fourth on Brown's solo blast over the centerfield wall for his fourth round-tripper of the season.

With GW leading 4-1, the Demon Deacons reached Conden for six runs in the bottom of the fourth. Ingold singled to left field to drive-in Jamie D'Antona. Mathias then reached on an error that allowed Brad Scioletti, who had doubled, and Jeff Ruziecki to score. Nick Blue later stroked a single to centerfield to score Ingold and Mathias. Before the end of the inning, D'Antona returned to blast a grand slam over the leftfield wall, scoring Ryan Hubbard, who had reached on a bunt single, Blue, and Johnson, who has singled through the right side. Freshman Dan Sullivan (Stony Point, NY/North Rockland) relieved Conden with one out in the bottom of the fourth but surrendered two more runs on two hits.

In the top of the sixth, Barry singled to shortstop for GW, scoring Raglani, who had tripled to centerfield. The run cut Wake Forest's lead to five. In the top of the seventh, GW added another run on a fielder's choice off the bat of Fertitta that allowed junior Jake Wald (Alexandria, VA/T.C. Williams) to score.

Wake added a pair of runs in the bottom of the seventh off of senior Chris Worth (N. Arlington, NJ/N. Arlington).

Sleeth (14-0) earned the win after pitching seven innings, allowing 11 hits and five earned runs while fanning 11 Colonials. Conden (11-3) was saddled with just his third loss of the year after pitching 3.1 innings and giving up seven earned runs on seven hits while striking out four Deacons.